From: Mike Dougherty (msd001@gmail.com)
Date: Tue Jan 10 2006 - 20:10:18 MST
I was reading the discussion at
http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0134.html
It seems there are some opposed to the evolution of humanity's software when
allowed to run on more capable/expansive hardware, saying that the whole
notion of uploading is sick or somehow risks an undefined concept of
"soul." I'm sure those who knew anything about DaVinci dissecting corpses
to learn the mechanics of muscles and viscera believed the whole thing
utterly ghoulish, but at the same time kept it from a public that would
certainly have been appalled to the point of arresting him. (No, i have not
done sufficient research on DaVinci's grave-robbing to be an authority - i'm
only speaking from unsourced "public knowledge")
I believe the research done by "computer science" in the realm of
reverse-engineering the biological brain is very similar to the macabre
research on the physical body. If the analogy is sound, then the
yet-unrealized potential of thoroughly understanding our own mental hardware
has application in realms as far beyond AI as muscular-skeletal principles
are applied beyond mundane engineering of cranes or bridges. The direction
this point is going is ultimately to Singularity - which is at the same time
self-evident to anyone on this list, it is also the only truly relevant
topic. So although this is not a suprising revelation, it is another point
of reference along the way.
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